September 5, 2004

Job 1:6-21 , as read by Pat Murphy

Mark 10:17-23 , as read by Anne Robertson

"As we have been preparing to launch the boat of our church into mission...,
but first, one last thing, a safety announcement." Anne Robertson

"The Question of Job"

Sermon ©2004 Anne Robertson

TEXT: Job 1:6-26

While I was in Scotland, every time I boarded a train, a bus, a ferry, or a plane, I heard safety instructions before we got underway. We're basically at that point now with our theme for the year. As we have been preparing to launch the boat of our church into mission, we've charted the course with the Apostles' Creed, trained the crew with the Spiritual Disciplines, and stocked the ship with the Fruit of the Spirit. We're on board and ready to go...but first, one last thing, a safety announcement.

Many times over this past year I have run into situations where people's faith has run aground on the rocks because tragedy struck. In a number of cases, there seemed to be the belief that if you were a Christian and did the right things, nothing bad would ever happen to you. Well, I hate to be the one to break the news, but that's not true. If Jesus had to go to the cross, then we who profess to be his disciples can hardly expect an easy road. If anything, being a Christian means a tougher road...Jesus said as much to his disciples...and I've found nothing in my own life to contradict that.

Safety announcements are not pleasant. It's nice to know that my seat cushion is really a floatation device, but it's not a great feeling to contemplate the airplane I'm sitting on plunging into the frosty North Atlantic. And so it is with this safety announcement in the church. We turn to the book of Job to hear it...that book that so many find profoundly disturbing because of what happens to the blameless and righteous man, Job.

For those who are not familiar with the story, it begins with God bragging on how good this man Job is. Satan then challenges Job's goodness and as a result, God puts Job to the test. First he loses all of his material possessions and all of his family, except his wife. Job passes that test. Then Satan ups the ante and wants God to make it harder, so God makes Job physically ill...covered in boils from head to toe. Job is downright miserable, moans and groans for a fair number of chapters. He has friends who show up and tell him that he must have sinned for God to do such things to him and tell him to repent, and Job begins to wish that maybe God would have taken his friends as well as his family. Job demands that God show up and explain all this, and God does appear. The trouble is, God doesn't really explain Job's question. Job wants to know...as we often do..."Why me?" God's answer is the divine version of that parental response that so annoys children..."Because I said so."

That Job's goodness is important is obvious from the beginning. The very first verse of the very first chapter points out Job's blameless and godly character. Then, a few verses later, the very first thing God wants Satan to notice on the earth is the goodness of Job. Job's upright character is a key part of the theme.

But notice what happens next, in 1:9. Satan's response to Job's goodness is to question his motive. "Does Job fear God for nothing?" Satan asks. I think this is the question of the book. "Have you not put a fence around him and his house and all that he has, on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land. But stretch out your hand now, and touch all that he has, and he will curse you to your face." It seems to me that the question the author of Job would like us to probe is not "Why do good people suffer?" but "Why are good people good?"

Satan, which means "the Accuser", has just asked the question still asked by those who seek to accuse the church today. "See Sally Churchgoer," says God. "She lives right, just like a Christian ought to. And you'll find her in church every Sunday with a tithe in her offering envelope."

"Well of course she does," says the challenger. "She's had it easy all her life. She's never known poverty or illness or tragedy...not really. She's just a good Christian because she thinks nothing really bad can happen to her that way. She is into this faith thing for herself, not for you, God. She doesn't love you for who you are, she loves you only because you give her what she wants. Take away those comforts and you'll see what her faith is really made of. You might be God, but if she doesn't get what she wants from you, she'll never darken that church door again. Just you try it!"

The question of Job, it seems to me, is raising the issue of whether we are able to pick up a cross and follow Jesus or whether we are only in the crowd because we have eaten our fill of loaves and fishes. Do we worship God as a way of paying for blessings we expect to receive or do we worship God simply because God is worthy of worship? I call this a safety announcement because if we are only in this righteousness boat to help ourselves get ahead or to protect ourselves from suffering, we are going to crash on the rocks. It is only when we live good and loving lives because that is the only true way to live...because we love God and that's what God asks...that we can navigate the storms and treacherous waters of life. How do you do that? Watch Job. The book of Job shows us how to be righteous in the midst of our suffering.

The first thing we see is that Job never saw anything that God had given to him as anything other than a gift. None of it was truly "his," and he knew it. Job never appropriated God's belongings...not his wealth, not his house, not his family. When it is all taken from him in a single day, Job responds in verse 1:21, "Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return there; the Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord."

Most of us lose the battle right here, because most of us think we are owners rather than stewards of God's gifts. We think that the things God has placed under our control are ours to do with as we please and find ourselves angry if God should require their return or move them into the hands of another steward. Now, please notice that Job is not jumping in the streets for joy. These losses are real blows. They really hurt, and Job shows all the signs of mourning. He shaves his head and tore his robe in grief. I'm not suggesting that the faithful response to loss is a mere shrug of the shoulders. Job felt the losses and grieved deeply. But then he fell on the ground and worshiped.

Until we have abandoned our notions of entitlement, this part of his response makes no sense, and we turn away from Job sad, like the rich young ruler in Luke 18 who just couldn't let go of absolutely everything and turned away from following Jesus. That is what Satan thought would happen with Job. When the Accuser points at us and says, "This one is only good because he's never really had to put his money where his mouth is," many of us have lost the challenge. And that is only chapter one.

It seems like Job surely must have passed the test, proving that there is such a thing as a human being who worships God simply because God is God. But the Accuser sees deeply into the human psyche and probes still further in chapter 2. "Yes," Satan says in essence, "He has been able to keep his priorities straight regarding those things outside of himself. But a man's body is his ultimate possession. Mess with that and you'll see that every person has a buyout price."

And Satan is right insofar as the affliction to Job's body is the straw that threatens to break the camel's back. It is hard to get more relevant to our own suffering. A loss here and there may be troublesome, but most of us manage. But if we live long enough, we all have those times when all the losses seem to save up and hit us all at once. We look around and see that not one area of life is going well.

When disaster piles upon disaster and loss upon loss, all of us are overwhelmed and we who profess faith want to know what a faithful response to such misery looks like. In the annals of Scripture, we have a few places we can turn. We can look to Jesus in His Passion, Paul singing in prison, Stephen being stoned, and others being persecuted in the early church. And we can look to Job, which is the longest and most detailed picture of what human suffering in the context of faith looks like.

In the speeches of Job and his friends, we see that suffering confounds even the most faithful. Job comes to curse and despise the day he was born. He wants to die. He complains to God and challenges God's justice. He demands that God show up and do some explaining. He wishes his friends would shut up and sit quietly with him instead of trying to explain away his pain.

This part of Job says to me that this is simply part and parcel of what suffering does. We know from the end of the book that Job passes the test. In 42:10 God says that Job has spoken what is right about God, and Job is rewarded for faithfulness. God has understood the nature of suffering and the darkness that it brings. Job's words were not sinful, even though Job called God's justice into question. When God shows up in response to Job's request for a hearing, the very presence of God brings the wisdom to know that God's ways are not our ways, but Job is not condemned for questioning that in the midst of his pain.

Why are we good? Why do we bother to try? For our own good? For fire insurance? Or for the love of God? Job proves that he is not placing his trust in God just for what he can get out of it. This is love of God for God's sake alone. But although the challenge is finished for Job, there is the sense that it will surface again. The Accuser goes back to his corner, but there is one more level he has not tried. Job's health has suffered, but God refused to let Job die. Everything was taken, but not his life. Satan can't do any more with Job, but he is willing to wait for another blameless man to come along.

At a more opportune time, the challenge surfaces again as Satan confronts Jesus. The challenges of Job are presented first in the wilderness temptations. Want wealth and authority, Jesus? Give up on God and worship me. Want fame and friends? Be spectacular and throw yourself off of the Temple and let the angels catch you. Suffering in your body? Hungry? Make these stones into bread. Jesus defeats Job's temptations handily. But how about death? That is Satan's trump card. We can almost hear the "skin for skin" discussion of Job escalating with Jesus.

And as it is tried, we see the same darkness of suffering descend. Even the sky turns black as Jesus feels and expresses the absence of God as he quotes Psalm 22: "My God, my God why have you forsaken me?" But in the end, with his dying breath, Jesus says, "Father, into thy hands I commit my spirit." The Accuser is defeated once and for all.

Why do the righteous suffer? Any answer to that is beyond my human understanding, and I find that I question God about it on a fairly regular basis, just as Job did. God's answer to Job seems to be bent on making him realize that the urgent question is whether our lives are centered on ourselves or on God. Just how far are you willing to go with God? Past your understanding? Past your comfort? To the Cross? All your heart? All your soul? All your mind? It's worth asking of ourselves, and I promise you that it is being asked by those who turn a critical and accusing eye toward the church. Is it really God that is important to us, or is it the benefits package? Amen.

Sermon ©2004 Anne Robertson

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